To ask another dumb question: you guys ARE using both the .vmi and the .vms files in your tinkering, correct?

I ask, because I have backed up a bunch of Fire Pro D saves in the past, and I had them available on my web site at one point. From visits to the biggest Fire Pro board, I noticed that not everyone (myself included, initially) understood the process. I'm giving you guys the benefit of the doubt here, but I figured it beared mentioning, just in case.

From my somewhat entry-level understanding of "how things work" here, it seems to me that all you'd have to do is find a way to get a browser (be it the Passport, or another source), to access a directory on the disc with your .vmi and .vms files, if you were to go the HTML route, not too much different from looking at local files that are on your hard drive or a CD-Rom.

Another possible option: including the directories in a LinuxDC build and using something like Mozilla or Lynx to access them. Not sure how that'd work out, though, since I'm pretty hopeless with the Linux still.

I was actually thinking, when I made my initial post, about some sort of separate, but simple database program that'd do this, rather than hacking some existing, closed-source program that wouldn't be legally distributable, and could be threatened by the ridiculous DMCA. My Linux suggestion would probably skirt those issues, but feasibility could be an issue, especially taking into account that LinuxDC was pretty slow when I used it, and definitely made with the VGA box in mind.

HTML, if you could get around the filetype issue, would be the easiest way for people who weren't tech-savvy to make their own discs, in all likelihood, but there's gotta be some other drag-and-drop interface available. Look at the DC emus themselves, which you can basically make a "roms" folder for, and put whatever you want in before burning.

Some of the coding know-how used for those could certainly be applied to making a simple archival utility, preferably as cross-platform as possible.

Just stirring the pot a bit, hoping to get some people who actually DO know what they're doing to work on something that could benefit ALL Dreamcast users, not just the ones who do the emulator thing. :D

i think you may have a hard time doing this, as what differentiates a vmu save download from whatever other kind of file is the MIME type http header information (x-app/*) the server is sending to you. without being able to change this (and you can't, it's not part of the .html page), you're porbably not going to fool DP into thinking that it's getting a vmu save.

[quote=Sub Woofer]
Didn't pSyCo come up with a solution to this at the old boards?

I thought it was really interesting, but I never actually bothered to try it out.

Perhaps we should see if he knows anything...
[/quote]

uh... he discovered that it didn't work... when you have saves on a CD with DP they open as text files rather than attempting to save them to your VMU. BUT it looks like they were linked as image files using the File:\\whatever command; I'm *pretty* sure thered be a way to do it using HTML so it will download them... Im still trying stuff at the moment, but its on the 'backburner' until I have some real free time to sit down and write a whole bunch of different HTML files and see if anything can be done thats not been tried (ie using the links as HREF links instead of Files, trying to open them in a _top frame etc)

Me and The Dumb Ass are still playing with this; I am *almost positive* I can whip up an HTML file for use with DP that will fool the DC into thinking its downloading a save, when its just reading one off the DC.

As I say, I'm still experimenting, but I'll let youse guys know if I can come up with anything useful...

What whiskers is talking about is trying to fool the DC it is downloading the files from the net. . Ie making a HTML file or editing the existing one that comes with the passport or whatever and having it link to files actually burnt onto the CD instead of downloading them from the net. . . While this sounds simple in practice or so im told simply dosnt work for some reason! There was a similar post on the old boards and I think pSyCo had a bash at it but was also unable to get it working

Might be a stupid question, but here goes: has anyone come up with a way to make CDs of VMU saves that can be easily loaded into your Dreamcast without a 'net connection, Game Shark, or Nexus card?

If not, I'd love to see something like this, just a simple utility that copies a directory of VMU saves onto disc, and adds a menu so you can select and load them when you pop the disc into your DC. No mess, no fuss, no need to have your DC 5 feet away from your PC at all times, and no hardware add-ons. Haven't looked extensively yet, but my initial searches for a tool of this nature haven't turned anything up.

If I had the time, I'd learn how to code one up m'self, as it'd be really handy for the memory-intensive stuff like Fire Pro Wrestling D and the sports games. It'd also be really handy to have around down the line for those of us who aren't lucky enough to have broadband adapters, since dialup connections will eventually be a thing of the past.

Surely, with the wealth of coding talent around this place, someone with the time and inclination would have a good shot of coming up with something.

Thats true, but many games (like Jet Set Radio, Marvel Vs Capcom 2, Virtua Tennis and many more) have a 'complete' save where you have unlocked everything, and these kind of saves usually take a long time to complete.

If you're not going to have internet access on your DC anymore and can't download new ones, or you only have one VMU and don't want to buy another for, say Bleem!Cast or DreamSPEC then it *would* make sense to have a CD with all your 'complete' saves on... I for one would *really* hate trying to unlock all of those characters and costumes again for my copy of MVC2... it SERIOUSLY took a *LOT* of playing to get them all in the first place...

Nice idea but when you load the files of a CD to VMU, when you play the game and get better score's it's not like the file can be written back to CD again easy is it. I mean you could upload and Burn again, but that would be milked!

To ask another dumb question: you guys ARE using both the .vmi and the .vms files in your tinkering, correct?

Yup. And I'm also tinkering with using the DC Web Browsers built in "save as" function - in case you didn't realise it you can save picture files (for, oh I don't know - tags in JSR?) by pressing (I think) X+A at the same time; If anyones actually interested in getting a head start on me on this (because I'm honestly not working on it *that* hard) the specific things I'm going to try are;

Loading the save as a 'new frame' (like the _top command) via a text link

testing how / if you can have direct .vms access without the .vmi - as I *think* thats where the problem lies, as the browser tries to open a .vmi file as a text file, which is no use at all.

I'm almost positive you *WILL* need to have your saves on a seperate directory rather than on root, and I was going to experiment with making an HTML file 'directory listing' using A HREF tags rather than the FILE tags the DC Browser seems to use to load images to have, say, a screenshot / box art pic of the file needing to be downloaded.

theres a couple of other things I'm going to try as well; I really don't think the MIME thing is the problem, because if it was it would be fairly easy to hex edit the .vmi file to say it *IS* a different type of file... I'm pretty sure its something to do with making the DC try to save a file rather than just open a file...

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